Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/47

Rh intimately connected with magical operations (and with fictions diverging from them) as to confer upon the possessor a title to supernatural agency, would extend their influence to the legendary stories, as well as to the manners of the west, which these very stories are admitted to describe! Yet, after all, it is not to be imagined that the introduction of eastern invention happened at one time, or in one age; it was rather the growth of many times, and of many ages—continually, though gradually augmenting, till it attained maturity.

The next hypothesis gives Armorica, or Bretany, as the source of romantic fiction. But to this, the same objections arise that have been started with respect to the rest. Mr. Ellis, in the introduction to his "Specimens of Early English Romances," plausibly suggests that all are compatible. He